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To Arturo Hernandez...I was unable to answer your thread for some reason. Sabotage?
The GOAT...Richard Gonzalez with the Don Budge backhand. AKA...Roger Federer as the GOOT.G.O.A.T. musings are just that. It is wind. Vanity. But it does not exist in a sport such as tennis. The game has been compromised. Engineered. Comparisons over different eras are invalid. Even within eras...that same is true. I wouldn't argue with you and your admiration of Roger Federer. Perhaps you could begin with a leaner version of the "Greatest Of All Time" and narrow it down to the "Greatest Of Our Time" and eliminate some of the obstructions to objectively compare the legacy of certain tennis players.
The sport of tennis underwent a radical change when it went "Open" in or around 1968. The "Open" aspect was with regard to professionals participating in Grand Slam events. This is the first line of demarcation. Grand Slam victory totals were going to undergo a radical change for obvious reasons. The more insidious aspect of the sport of tennis going "Open" was the influx of money that was going to pour into the sport. With large amounts of money goes the accompanying corruption and the sport was going to be gutted and corrupted beyond recognition in just ten years or so.
What followed the opening up of the game to professionals in the traditional tournaments happened very quickly. But first there was an accelerated evolution of the sport with the initial financial incentives. In the years that followed 1968, the first year that I picked up a racquet ironically, was the golden age of tennis that culminated in the John McEnroe/Bjorn Borg rivalry. Unfortunately the powers that be at the time saw a short cut to the slower evolutionary route and they introduced a new game...bangball. The use of oversized racquets revolutionized or rather destroyed the original game by the time the 1984 U. S. Open was played. It was at this tournament where all four men's semifinalists used over-sized graphite racquets for the first time in tennis history. Ironically, I was there on the September day in New York. Bud Collins called it the greatest day of tennis ever. It was spectacular to be sure. But the illusion was cast. He never mentioned that it was indeed the first time that the use of over-sized racquets was complete. Even the ladies were on board. Marina and Chris both used over-sized graphite on that day of crossing the rubicon.
Which brings us to Roger Federer and his standing in tennis history...GOAT or GOOT. There is no reason to try and equate his standing over the long haul...due to the complete overhaul in the conditions of the game under the title of controllable conditions. Racquets, strings, court surfaces and even foot wear have to be taken into account. I remember seeing the tennis sneakers that Richard Gonzalez wore...the flimsiest of canvas tennis shoes one could imagine wearing from our perspective. There is even an issue when considering whether or not Roger was indeed the "Greatest Of Our Time" in that he made an equipment change rather late in his career that sort of threw those Grand Slam numbers for a flooey. When he switched to the larger racquet from his 90 square inch frame to his 98 square inch frame his game went through the most amazing transformation. Suddenly he could drive his backhand with impunity...for example. The rest of his game also was elevated by a corresponding percentage as the area of his tennis frame. As tennis is a game of small windows and margins...well you get the picture.
After switching to the bigger frame Roger defeated his closest rival of the years seven of the eight times he last played him. Rafael Nadal. Roger went from 9-23 to 16-24 Head to Head just like that. If that is not one of the greatest tells in sports history...well, I'll be a monkey's uncle. So much for the GOAT discussion. It just isn't possible due to a real lack of meaningful data. The sport over time opened itself up to the greatest skewing in history.
For the record...I wrote about nearly every single Roger Federer tennis match over a span of ten or eleven years. As far as tennis goes...Roger was tennis. He was the face of tennis for that period of time. Of course there was Rafa Nadal and Novak Djokovic and not to mention Andy Murray as his foremost competitors. But I think that historically the depth of the draws of this era were very shallow in comparison to the draws of the past. Another factor is the use of highly undetectable Performance Enhancing Drugs. But the biggest factor is one of illusion. The illusion that the game is played under even conditions over the years. The illusion that Roger Federer became that much of a better player after changing equipment. The illusion that the the players of today are superior physically over the players of yesterday. That is sheer nonsense. Consider the fact that the game used to have the possibly of being played as a never ending marathon before the use of the tie-break.
GOAT discussions are sheer and utter nonsense and usually carried on by modern day tennis aficionados who lack historical perspective. But once certain tennis historians pass on the control of the narrative be will be left to the modern liberal tennis fans who will make a joke of the players of the past with a smug sense of superiority of the modern player. I often wonder what Roger would do with a Dunlop Maxply Fort racquet. Or even a Spalding Smasher aluminum number that Richard Gonzalez was playing with along with his flimsy canvas sneakers.
So all that being said...my GOAT evaluation reads like my tennis teaching paradigm. William Tilden II is the book. Richard Gonzalez is the model with the Don Budge backhand. Harry Hopman is the coach. Roger Federer is the Living Proof.
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